Fix it yourself, or not

Fixing it yourself can save a LOT of money, if you know what you are doing or can follow instructions. If you don't know, it's usually cheaper to pay for the regular maintenance and repairs by a professional. I change light bulbs, paint, and minor woodwork. Power tools are usually for those who know how to use them well and safely. I've replaced electric and light fixtures but if I currently have a professional I know and trust at the time, I figure it's worth it to have someone else to it.

When considering whether to hire for something we CAN do, it often isn't just the bare monetary cost that I consider, though that's part of it. The other big piece is the time: do I have any, will I get to it without having to give up something else valuable or important, like leave time, family time, or time for twenty other projects that I actually prefer to do myself, like cooking and crafts as well as things that could earn me an eventual income (school, work...).

Price of healthy eating

Play with the math. It's easy to say that some of the healthiest foods re expensive - I am always shocked at how expensive a tiny bit of berries can be, even in season, and the best green vegetables cost more than meat, sometimes, so it becomes easy to say that they are out of the budget. However, sweets and chips typically cost even more per serving unless they are made at home. And a dinner out - way more! So if you are trying to persuade yourself that you should do something, and keep coming against the cost, look for something that can be given up, or that you should be giving up and do the math there. If that's not enough, look up the price of paying for medicine and surgery. With even basic off-the-shelf pain relievers going up, the price of healthy eating starts to look easier to digest.

Start the New Year Right

One of the most important steps in saving money isn't coupon cutting or careful shopping or any other of the suggestions I've made, it's setting aside money to not spend, to perhaps never spend but at least not to spend for a very long time: in other words, saving money. Besides avoiding spending money, two things in particular help make the idea into a reality:

1) Have a reason to save money. One of the best ways to give yourself a reason is to consider what you want for when you finally get around to retiring: just a comfortable retirement, a cruise, a particular vision of what counts as a great retirement house? A lifestyle appropriate to being grandma or grandpa? The clearer the picutre of what yo wnat to do with the money, the more specific, the more aware of what that will cost to achieve, the more real and reachable it will seem and the greater the incentive it will provide.

2) A plan to get there. Savings now translate to twice that later, so set a high but achievable goal for how much more money you want in the bank by the end of the year than you have now. 10 percent of income is a good place to start your calculations. If necessary payments take up a large percentage of income, an adjustment down may be necessary. IF income is variable, more when income is higher and less when income is lower may be the way to go.

3) It helps but isn't necessary to have a plan of attack, such as a regular transfer of money from checking to savings, regular deposits, or a common purchase that will no longer be made in order to free up more cash for the savings jar.

Check the dollar store first

Each 'dollar store' (The Dollar Store, Dollar Tree, Dollar other things... even different stores in the same chain) has its own selection, and quality is a definite consideration prior to purchasing, but for things where quality is less of a concern than that something functional be on hand when needed, a dollar or similar discount store can cut costs by a third with no other impact.

I find this especially true for party things. It's amazing how much party supplies can add up. A good party store is more likely to have exactly what you want for the perfect presentation and a very specific theme (It just has to be dinosaurs), but they often have unnecessarily large quantities and the the dollar-type stores sometimes have plenty that fits an appropriate theme, especially if all that really matters is that the holiday or celebration be right (I's not cool to have "over the hill" balloons for a kids birthday party, for example, or birthday napkins for an anniversary, but maybe it doesn't matter if its Thanksgiving turkeys or pilgrims or just fall colors). They may not have pirates, but they might have bright colors or clowns or something else appropriate for a birthday, and napkins and paper plates to match.

What they most often lack is large quantities. Occasionally they might have several packages the same but there's no guarantee. They are not a store for buying in bulk. Another thing they are good for is storage and presentation containers. When you are giving away cookies, for example, it's nice to give them in a container that the recipient keep, even better if it one they can keep. If they are only for one person, maybe a fancy tin is worthwhile, but if you have a lot of people to give cookies to, and you want them to appreciate the cookies more than the container, a dollar store might offer reusable containers (singly or two or three at a time depending on size and type) as cheap or cheaper than the grocery store disposal containers that have recently become more readily available (to the dismay of "green" supporters and environmentalists). They might not have the exact style you're looking for, but the recipients don't know what you have in mind and the dollar store's are likely to have something in the ballpark of what you need. Let the cookies take their attention. That's where you put the effort.

Christmas shopping lists

There are lots of ways to Christmas shop. I shop all year, finding it easier to find interesting gifts at unfamiliar stores when I travel. Toward the end of the year, though, it's time to be a little more organized and I start matching gifts to recipients, to make sure that I have something for everyone, and to make sure I haven't bought enough for a couple of Christmases. When the budget is tight, I check sooner. Give yourself a budget for gifts and stick to it. A "little extra" adds up rapidly over several gifts for several people.

The other way to handle limited financial budgets (or something to consider if not limited) is to consider whether it might be appropriate to spend time instead of money. Crafters say that the time it takes to make something is worth ten times the material cost of supplies, and the reactions of recipients often seem to prove the point, even for crafts that don't take much skill or training. It's like certain wonderful treats (one of the ones I like is ginger-candied orange peels, but it takes a lot of careful peeling to make a little pile of treats) that you know are a pain to make: you so appreciate the person who went to the bother of making it because it's your favorite! Since I've been doing a bunch of crochet this year, I became aware that crocheted and knitted things have become more rare in the stores, so a certain uniqueness value is added, too. Handmade Christmas ornaments might not get much use, but can be an annual reminder of you and your interest in the recipient, much more so than something purchased at a store. Time is precious. Spending a little of it on a friend or family members can make a great gift.

Don't mix ink and clothes

Especially check pockets to make sure that pens are still not in pockets when the clothes are put in washing machine or drier. They sometimes survive the washer, but rarely the drier, and replacing clothes is always a bit hard on the budget. yeah, personal experience and periodic reminders...

Holiday Foods Cheaper

With the approach of the holidays, my mind always turns to food and menus. I like to try new recipis and experiment though the family doesn't always appreciate it and the bulk of the menu is usually family traditional. Still, the budget has varied and the food with it. Along the way, experiments and all, I've found some good tricks for serving festive and formal meals that didn't have to be expensive. Here are a few tips:

Hors d'ouvers (however that's spelled) always add something to the party atmosphere. They can be as cheap as "dollar store" ingredients or pricy, and it won't matter a whit to your guests: what matters is that you spend a little bit of time putting them together, preferably in several colorful combinations: crackers topped with cheese spread, some with an olive half, some with a quarter sausage slice will do nicely. Sliced hotdogs heated in barbecue sauce and served with toothpicks makes a nice hot alternative and give the host or hostess a chance to mingle with guests as he brings them around, still hot.

Basic foods "dressed up" will also add to the sense that you're giving your guests a treat. We dress up macaroni and cheese or other casserole foods by piling it into a baking dish (lightly oiled). We crush six or eight saltines with a little melted butter, and sprinkle the results on top. Bake for half an hour (forty five minutes if the cassarole was made ahead and is cold) to brown the crackers. Alternatively , dress up a bowl of mac and cheese with a sprinkling of paprika or a pattern of paprika and parsley for a pretty effect. Dress up canned beans by adding slivered almonds. The little added touches turn a common meal into something special.

Cheap meats can serve as well as expensive ones: the main thing is to cook them appropriately. Don't buy a cheap roast and cook it like a steak. The results will be unpleasant in all respects. Instead, cook it appropriately for a roast and present it on a pretty platter. If you do it as a pot roast, take the large chunk vegetables (we usually do quartered potatoes, small or halved carrots, and onion quarters with a pot roast, foil-wrapped baked potatoes with an oven roast, with thinly sliced onions as a flavoring on the roast itslf) and spread them around the side of the meat on a platter. Serve the broth on the side for gravy or save it as a soup base for leftovers and rice.

If you need to make several meals for guests staying over, you can keep them satisfied and your budget in control by stretching a soup lunch with the addition of rice, potatoes, or pasta. Pasta can be added directly to the soup (it will tend to turn it into a cassarole) or cream soups and thicker soups like chili can be served as a generous sauce over the top of pasta for a filling meal.

Jello can be made into an elegant dessert by making it with an extra packet of gelatin, cutting it up when it's firm, and mixing it with whipped topping and maybe fresh fruit. For a large group, use more than one flavor, make them separately, and mix the cubes together for a colorful treat. Alternatively, separate the liquid from a single flavor into two or three separate dishes, one of them them the serving dish or a series of individual dessert dishes. Chill the other parts only part way: whip. Add one to the serving dish in its new foamy state, stir whipped topping into the other third and put it on top of the rest for a three-layer dessert. It's the obvious effort to make it pleasing to both eye and pallat, not the expense of the dessert, that impresses friends and family best. (And a light dessert is all folks will have room for after a filling meal.)

Try cooking again

We laughed at the recent news about food stamps and fast food that suggested fast food could be cheaper than eating in. Not if you are comparing apples to apples, and not if you are paying attention to what you buy! Fast food is cheap food. You can make a lot of hamburgers with a loaf of bread and a pound of cheap ground beef, but you can only buy a couple for the same price. (What, three dollars, maybe as little as two for a quarter pounder, times four for a pound of ground beef, so eight to twelve dollars for a pound of beef and a loaf of bread? Where are these news people doing their shopping? Is it ground filet minon?) You can buy several potatoes for the price of french fries, too.

Now, if you are eating better at home than fast food fare, that's different. In some areas, garden vegetables and even canned and frozen vegetables have gone up in price, but an entire can of green beans, peas, or carrots is still normally cheaper than any dollar menu item, and both healthier and more filling. A 2 liter bottle of soda might cost more than a medium soda but probably less than a large for twice as much. An entire dozen eggs is cheaper than any fast food breakfast sandwich and contains less salt and fat. Yes, fast food is cheaper than a steak grilled at home, but hardly a fair comparison. It's not cheaper than fast food made at home and fast food restaurants for more than an occasional treat aren't a wise choice for anyone on a limited budget or anyone trying to save up for something special.

It's not saving if you're spending

Sale's, specials, and package deals often push how much the buyer "saves". In reality, purchasing something on sale is still spending. Saving means putting money in the bank. Sometimes the deals are really good: if you think they are, do the math, consider if you would soon buy it anyway: but if you wouldn't, don't buy. It's still money going out that you would otherwise have kept hold of. The trick with package deals is that they often include something you wouldn't buy normally. If the deal is so good that the things you would buy, ignoring that you get something extra, too, then it might be worth considering, but if you still have to pay some extra to get the extra, there is no savings, only more spending than you would have done otherwise.

Buy the Right Thing at the Right Time

Often, the right thing to buy is the more expensive one. Food, not so much, unless you need it for something special, like a fancy dinner or a hiking trip where every ounce of weight and every day it lasts is important. We go to the cheapest stores that carry what we need for our every-day meals. but when we buy things that are intended to last, we shop with something besides cost in mind. We've done the cheap route, and for some products, cheap lasts as long as the more expensive and does what it needs to do, but for many things, especially gadgets, cheap can be expensive. Cheap appliances have to replaced more frequently, cheap furniture doesn't stay looking nice for long, and cheap bookcases having sagging shelves shortly for anything but paperbacks. So we looked for quality, too, and if more expensive means better construction, we'll pay the difference.

On the other hand, we don't buy the better one when we have one that works. Chairs wear, but they wear slowly. Only when we see that over time a chair is beginning to wear out and it's not something that can be readily repaired (chairs can be re-apholstered if the stuffing beneath is still good, but sometimes it gets mushed beyond fluffing or decays, or springs give way and start poking through. Then it's time to start shopping, but not necessarily to buy immediately. Watch for stores that have regular or frequent sales. Study the options so that you're buying something you'll like for years, not just something that looks like what you have now or fits the current fad.

If you like brand names, look for brand names with a reputation of reliability and quality, not fashion, double for appliances and tools, which can look identical but are worlds apart in the quality of the metal and other materials and parts. For things that move, look for metal. If plastic is the only option, look for plastic that is strong, with sharper turns and steep angles. Gears and zippers that are rounded and shallow are more likely to become unusable quickly, because they are made that way when cheap, weak plastic is being used to make them.

Periodically, even long-lasting things begin to deteriorate or no longer served the purpose you need them for and expensive purchases will need to be made, but if the purchase is done with thought and care, it will be a long time before you need to do a second time.

Tip: Technology will always be ahead

Don't try to keep up with technology. These days, only the rich and those who have to keep up in one field for their career can hope to stay up-to-date on technical things. So long as the version you have does what you need it to, hand onto it. I upgraded my computer only when it got to the point that the most advanced software it could handle was still too old to go to a lot of the web sites I needed for e-mail, agent hunting and other important online activities. I saw it comeing, was able to save for it, and could afford a good, up-to-date replacement. I've had to replace the hard drive on this, my second computer, once, and plan on holding onto it awhile longer, though i can see the signs of needing a new one and have started to save accordingly.

Besides the obvious of not spending money that you don't have to, waiting has several advantages, especially though not only with technical things.
: With technical things, prices are prone to come down.
: time to save up for big expenses means the opportunity to buy the best, longest-lasting and most up-to-date version so that it is longer before another is needed.
: time to consider what is really needed and buy the right thing.
: the longer it lasts, the more value it has, cost per day as you might say.

Tip: clip coupons for what you buy, not what you don't

We don't spend lots of time clipping coupons but we do watch for coupons for the kinds of things we always need: toilet paper and tissues, canned vegis and other nonperishable foods, and certain restaurants that we like to go to as the occasional treat. What we don't do is buy just because we have a coupon. Let coupons expire if you don't need them and wouldn't have bought it anyway.

Tip on grocery shopping

The big size isn't necessarily the best buy anymore. Stores or producers seem to have decided to take advantage of the long-established practice of selling the bigger size cheaper-per-ounce, by upping the price randomly. For those who use a lot of some item (so that the large size might be worth the buying, if the cost is better), it's well worth checking the per-ounce cost before you buy. There is little use in buying lots that won't be used, though, as getting too much just spends money earlier than needed and often results in significant waste, as well as leaving less to earn interest in the savings account.

Tip:Don't grocery shop on an empty stomach

Hunger encourages whim buying and discourages taking time to compare prices (and ingredients). Big sizes used to be cheaper, a good buy if you normally go through a lot, but that's often no longer the case as producers or stores take advantage of the common assumption. Check also real contents, not box size: they don't shrink the can or box just because they are selling you less than they used to, or you may be buying more filler and less of what you want.

As an example, check out the juice aisle: 100% juice isn't the same as 100% of the juice on the label. Apple juice and white grape juice are common substitutes: cheap, sweet, and less nutritious than many of the other juices. "Juice drinks" are even worse, barely more than koolaid. Go for the koolaid mix if you're aiming for flavored sugar water and buy some reusable water bottles for taking it along. It's vastly cheaper for the same thing. Shop wise, not just cheap.

Tip: Avoid sale shopping

It may be counter-intuitive, and there are exceptions, but sales tempt us to buy things we don't need in greater quantity than we need them. A sale is still a purchase, and the best sale price is still more costly than buying nothing at all.

Tip: Learn to Cook

Home cooked foods are always cheaper than restaurant fare. With a little care, they are usually cheaper and healthier than fast food, too, and being healthier is cheeper than being sick. Basics like rice, simple roasts, potatoes, vegetables and fruit are all easy to prepare with a minimum of guidance. For the bolder cook, sugar and flour and small amounts of ingredients are far cheaper and usually better than store-vought treats (desserts at the store are especially expensive because you are paying for a lot of preparation effort and packaging besides the food itself). If you are interested in recipis, let me know what you are looking for. I have a wide array and am happy to add more detailed instructions for the beginner.

Tip: Figure out what you want

Set financial goals and wishes: what do you want that takes some money to achieve or to achieve well. Choose realistic short term and medium term goals but shoot for the moon for the long term future. Find out how much they cost. DON'T try to figure out how much you need to set aside each month to get to the long term goals unless you're really good with compound interest and inflation rates, besides, calculating how much to set aside isn't the point. Setting a goal, and keeping it in mind is an achievement of its own. And keep in mind for that long term dream, the sooner you start saving, the less you'll need to put in the bank.

Tip: keep a spending log

Keep a spending log, and an income log if your paycheck varies from week to week. Like dieters who record their food intake, the mere act of writing it down regularly can help get it under control by building awareness. Small purchases, especially, can go by unnoticed, but they add up fast and suddenly the wallet is a hundred dollars lighter, much of it spent on things we didn't need. Keeping track for several months also provides enough information to start thinking about making a budget. Too many people try to start with a budget before they know what they regularly spend, get frustrated when it doesn't come out, and quit, and that never helps. Just find a notebook of a comfortable size (not something I would recommend for the computer! even a handheld that you can take with), a comfortable pen, and write down everything you spend when you spend it.

A new category--Finance Lessons from Dad

The new category isn't just about things Dad said, but things I learned indirectly from those early lessons, and through experience, mostly modestly successful since then. the new category will mostly be little tips and descriptions of my own experience working at being financially "independent" (in my definition, having more than I owe) and maintaining good security ratings and all.

I don't offer advice on achieving real wealth. I haven't figured that one out beyond finding a better paying job than I have, nor how to make money from nothing. I've managed steady if not always great paying work and that's the only starting point I know. Steady income isn't always enough, though. Plenty of people who make more than I do, however, still find themselves floundering in financial confusion and problems, and others just don't seem to make as much progress as they want, so I thought a few practical if inexpert tips might be useful.

Tip #1 -- this one is from Dad -- Keep your credit card balance at 0 and if it isn't, get it there as fast as you can.

He's gotten past not wanting to use them at all, but he, and I, still pay them down every month with very very rare exception. If I can't afford to pay the card off when the bill comes in, then I can't afford it all, that's the concept, because paying interest--and even the better credit cards have a lot-- just means you are spending more money in the long run, and buying less of what you want and need. Once in a grat while I've paid a large bill off in two installments, but I didn't use a credit card again until it was paid off.